ARCHELON was established in 1983 under the name The Sea Turtle Protection Society of Greece, and it is a non- profit association aiming at the conservation of sea turtles and their habitats in Greece. It's main activities are monitoring and research, rescue and rehabilitation of sick and injured turtles and raising public awareness.

ARCHELON is a Partner to the UNEP/Mediterranean Action Plan, a member of the European Union for the Conservation of the Coasts (EUCC). Members of ARCHELON participate in the IUCN/Marine Turtle Specialist Group and contribute to the formulation of the international strategy for the conservation of sea turtles.

ARCHELON collaborates closely with state agencies, the local authorities, institutions, other NGOs, fishermen and local inhabitants in order to mitigate and reverse population reduction of sea turtles. We also participate and contribute in the implementation of projects co-funded by the European Union.

Our main conservation efforts include

• Monitoring, implementation of protection and management measures and public awareness in the major loggerhead nesting areas of Zakynthos, the Peloponnese (Kyparissia –Lakonikos-Koroni) and Crete.
• Operation of the Rescue Center for injured and sick sea turtles in Glyfada near Athens and of the Rescue network along the Greek coastline.
• Surveys and data collection, pilot habitat management and restoration and sea turtle conservation actions at sea.
• Public awareness and environmental education

Internships are welcomed by ARCHELON for a set of tasks relating to the role of field leaders and a different set of tasks relating to full time volunteers.

A limited number of internships is available for the role of field leaders and interns will receive the specialized and necessary training to perform these tasks. For those limited posts there is no participation fee. Once confirmed, and upon their arrival to the project, interns are asked to give their Field Coordinator all the paperwork that needs to be submitted by ARCHELON upon the completion of the internship. This is very important so that the required documents will be ready on time. More information on the field leader profiles and how to apply please see here.

All other interns will receive the same training and have the same tasks as the rest of the full time volunteers. Unfortunately, ARCHELON cannot support any training activities outside of the described volunteer duties and is unable to provide a tutor or mentor especially for interns. Once confirmed, and upon their arrival to the project, interns are asked to give their Field Leader all the paperwork that needs to be submitted by ARCHELON upon the completion of the internship. This is very important so that the required documents will be ready on time. The volunteer participation fee for interns is included in the Overview Table. From 1/1/2020 fees are applied as shown in the Overview Table of Participation fees as well as the cancellation policy and policy for the change of participation dates. Relevant information can be seen here.

In any case, any paperwork required by the University must be sent to the Volunteers Officer well beforehand, preferably with your application.

Please note that no ARCHELON project data can be collected or used for personal projects or any report you may have to write.

You are advised to carefully check the information of our projects about duties, accommodation, dates and fees, free time as well as the participation guidelines in order to select the project you are interested in before applying.

Please inform the Volunteers Officer (volunteers@archelon.gr) of the requirements of the University within 10 days after submitting your on-line application and preferably before the end of February 2020.

There are some research opportunities for students or post-doctoral researchers in the projects of ARCHELON, which can be organized during their voluntary work. As a rule, only former volunteers of ARCHELON can submit a research proposal and the deadline for submitting a research proposal is the 15th of March every year. 

More information for students click here. More information for post-doctoral researchers click here.

If you decide to submit a research proposal, please fill in either the Appendix for Students or the Appendix for Post-docs and email it, together with your proposal, to volunteers@archelon.gr. If you have any queries please contact the Volunteer Section at volunteers@archelon.gr

We will reply to you about the progress of your application within 2 weeks.